


Fidelity and fondness

by godbewithyouihavedone



Category: Hamilton - Miranda, Historical RPF
Genre: Anal Fingering, BDSM, Bondage, Boot Worship, Desk Sex, Edging, Essay-writing, Face-Fucking, Hair-pulling, M/M, Overstimulation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 21:29:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6025789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/godbewithyouihavedone/pseuds/godbewithyouihavedone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Laurens reaches forward, as Alexander scoots back into him to allow him access to the desk.  But instead of retrieving a paper, he grabs his wrist and yanks it backward, nails digging in.</i>
</p><p>  <i>Alexander tries to look back. “John, what—”</i></p><p>  <i>He feels coarse rope loop around his wrist, then Laurens pulls it tight, and the knot, already tied before the attack, presses against the soft inside.  He can feel his pulse leap against it.  Alexander tries to stand, but his friend shoves him by his shoulders back into the chair. He captures the other wrist.</i></p><p>  <i>“Calm down, Alexander,” Laurens says, voice too close in his ear, as even as when he appeared forgiving.</i></p><p>Ladies and gentlemen, you could’ve been anywhere on the web tonight, but you’re here with me on Archive of Our Own.  Are you ready for some filthy fucking porn?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fidelity and fondness

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: the scene is not pre-negotiated. A safeword is not used because there is no consent-play and they’re in the 1700s, but it is clear that all activities would stop if the sub asks. They use sperm whale oil as lube during part of the sex (again, 1700s). I did a lot of historical research for this level of kinky smut and the beginning shows it (it’s loooong). If someone out there exists with an essay-writing kink, they are in for a treat.

He just has to finish this train of thought, exhaust the ink currently on his quill, and then all will be well. The sisters will not be home for hours, so there remains plenty of time. He is loathe to lose the connection that occurred to him regarding the politics of Greece. Though Alexander desperately wishes to give his friend the whole of his attention, the writing will not leave him alone.

If he had not been so clever in the planning of the excursion, he could not afford even these few moments. Everything is meticulously arranged. As a soldier, he learned how imperative the timing of a maneuver remained to its success or failure.

As a suitor, he studied a different kind of patience with General Schuyler and his wife, still tender from the elopement of their eldest. So much has changed since he saw his Laurens last, and his writing to Pennsylvania hardly conveys the transformation of his station.

Dear Betsy and Angelica are visiting, and so he set for dinner tonight with a few others. The wedding is to occur in December, in a mansion he has visited and marveled at. Under stately pillars, he will give up his liberty, and mostly with gladness. Afterwards, they shall begin to build a home. He will no longer be afforded the privacy this evening allows.

Now it occurs to him that Greece is a fine example, especially of the weakness of a network of republics undefended and unpatriotic toward each other. The Italian city-states a hundred years back would prove additionally evidential. Yet some men see Greece as merely an experiment in governing sustained by a richness of philosophy and art, turning to the Romans as proof of strong systemic politicking. If he mentions the Romans, it will only remind his audience that one central body is no guarantee of stability. He ought to allude rather than to explain, then. He can show how America will outstrip all her forbearers, using wisdom from past states that attempted liberty.

That will require elucidation, and he has been waiting. Laurens he left in the sitting-room. Perhaps by now he has divested himself of hat and coat, rolled his sleeves up. His beloved friend understands his preoccupation.

Any other would think these actions rude. Alexander begged him to let him visit at the first convenience, before army duties pulled them away again, and then shut him out. But it would be another form of neglect, to join him with the rhetoric still swirling around his head, unable to focus on their reunion.

Idea leads to idea which flows into idea. Alexander emerges, as if from a trance, hands shaking. A lone bead of sweat drops from the end of his nose and onto the last page. He finishes with a warning about the end likely to befall their national structure if this situation continues unabated. It is complete; or at least, there is no more draft to scrawl. His haste has likely led to errors and in a week he must revisit the essay.

He does not remember how long ago he promised himself one last sentence would satisfy. Through the window, he sees the shift of the sun, from noon when he started, now dipping west, if not yet journeying. The edge of his wrist aches from writing. A section of his hair has fallen into his eyes; he gathers it up again, unwilling to appear as careless as his actions.

The papers spread across his desk, his sleeves flecked with ink. He has not replenished the lamp and it burns low. Normally, he would not leave this disorder be, but it is no good wasting further time.  
He opens the door to call for Laurens, to offer apologies. Instead he sees the man is leaning on the wall across from him, absorbed in a new edition of _De Rerum Natura_. When he had left him, his green ribbon marked the front; now it sits nearer to the end than the beginning. How long has it been? When had he made his way to before the study?

“The third book,” Laurens says. His eyes flick up, taking in Alexander’s harried look. “Focused on phenomena. But you probably devoured the thing years ago.”

Alexander blushes, stepping into the hall. His stomach flips, as if advancing toward forces of greater numbers and skill. It is a familiar dread, but not one he has had to feel in this man’s presence. He has erred terribly. “I am sorry, my dear friend, for my actions today. You have shown greater trust than I deserve, leaving me to finish my thoughts, and I only exploited your lenience. _Nil fieri ex nihilo, in nihilum nil posse reverti._ ”

Laurens laughs, and closes the book around its ribbon. “You are far more to me than nothing, as you are aware, and I knew I only needed to knock to end my banishment. Do not think of it.”

“It has been hours—”

“How else would I push myself to study Lucretius?” Laurens touches his arm, raising his eyebrows when his fingertips come away with little specks of ink. “Oh, Hamilton, I never saw you abandon such a mess, even when we lived in tents under siege. Did you fail to order your papers on my account?”

Alexander shakes his head. “What if you had lost your patience and left?”

Laurens smiles. “Dear boy, I would not abandon your side, as long as it is within my power to stay. Let me help you finish your affairs here, and then we will talk.”

He stows the book in the familiar red pack slung around his shoulder. When he rolls his sleeves up, he reveals new scar on his right forearm. It is only a faint white line, more noticeable for a lack of hair over it. Alexander wants to ask him what happened in Savannah, but then Laurens steps into the room, turns so Alexander will follow him.

He begins to refill the lamp.

“Careful, the can holds winter-strained oil,” Alexander says.

“I was wondering how it no longer stunk like a carcass where you make your study,” Laurens says. He is likely used to this quality, but he pours gently for Alexander’s sake.

“A present from my Betsy. Entrapment has its advantages.” Alexander sits at his desk, capping the inkwell so that he will have no more spots on his jacket.

“You say you see the benefits, but you have not experienced marriage yet, only the approach of it.” The lamp ignites, and Laurens’s fine features are illuminated. Alexander swallows, hoping he imagined the bitter taste to those words. Laurens is married, although he did not know that when they began their friendship.

Perhaps, if he had been one to brag about his wife, as Lafayette did, they would not have progressed to this point. Or perhaps it would have posed no danger to their closeness. The past is not often pleasant for Alexander to think over. And he is not ending their connection, despite current awareness, so it hardly matters.

Laurens walks up behind him as he is stacking the books he referenced at the edge of his desk, to return to his library tonight. “Lean back, I need to get that…”

Laurens reaches forward, as Alexander scoots back into him to allow him access to the desk. But instead of retrieving a paper, he grabs his wrist and yanks it backward, nails digging in.

Alexander tries to look back. “John, what—”

He feels coarse rope loop around his wrist, then Laurens pulls it tight, and the knot, already tied before the attack, presses against the soft inside. He can feel his pulse leap against it. Alexander tries to stand, but his friend shoves him by his shoulders back into the chair. He captures the other wrist.

“Calm down, Alexander,” Laurens says, voice too close in his ear, as even as when he appeared forgiving.

He pulls Alexander’s other arm around the chair as well, easing his hand into another loop as his fingers flex out. When the rope is tight around both wrists, he lets go. Alexander pitches forward, and the knot catches, pulling him against the back of the chair. Laurens’s shadow leans over him.

“Was this in your pack all this time?” Alexander asks. His voice trembles.

“I had ample time to form it,” Laurens says. His fingers skim Alexander’s jaw. “You have done me an injustice, as you rightly realized.”

“A moment more with you and I would have forgotten all my arguments,” Alexander says. He does not know why he is defending himself, even as he says the words. It is more than obvious which one of them has the advantage on this field.

“Every letter you sent me conveyed utter desperation for our reunion. I ought to be in camp, where I have been sent for, and where I have been so long absent. But instead I shirked duties far more necessary than your playing orator to be here. And how am I repaid for these pains?”

Alexander cannot help but sigh when his fingers slip down, begin to loosen his cravat. “What answer would you have me give?” he asks. “I am unencumbered now, or I could be. Let us take the time we have.”

“There are places in the world where your demands do not reach. Keep talking, make any point you like. I am sure you have quite a bit to say about freedom. Only do not mistake what has brought us here.”

“If I apologize, will you untie me?”

Laurens does not answer, which is reply enough.

They have discussed this, the heat that runs under his blood when he is restrained, kept safe yet immobilized. But no action had been taken, and Alexander had assumed the matter forgotten. Laurens has a somewhat bewildering collection of books from his time in Europe that he guards. Long nights drinking and discussing philosophy in the dark led to unexpected honesty even before they first shared a bed. Interest in the male form was enough of a revelation, and it took awhile to proceed from admissions to actions. Alexander thought the rest was less important. One mistake, of the many he has committed here.

“I could stand,” Alexander says.

Laurens smooths out his collar, finishes, whisking the cravat away, then dangles it in front of Alexander’s face, like a prize. It is the color of fatty cream, one of the nicest he owns. “You don’t need to be anywhere but here,” Laurens says. “I thought you’d learned that.”

He fastens the cravat around Alexander’s eyes. It is not thick enough to block out all light. He can see the hazy pinprick of the lantern, the bright rays of sun from the window. Laurens’s breath is in his ear. He reaches down Alexander’s shirt, touching the center of his chest, skimming what little hair he can grow.

Then Laurens draws the chair back. Alexander falls into it, swallowing as he is pulled so that Laurens may crowd in front of him, legs brushing Alexander’s thighs. He begins to unbutton his waistcoat, and push his jacket back. His hands are warm, careful like a promise, and Alexander doesn’t know why he wants to cry. He isn’t scared anymore, or at least it is an edge of fear tinged in beauty and acceptance. Like facing down an enemy, but altogether dearer.

“For all the whining you do about how often I write you, we are quite mismatched in our priorities,” Laurens says. He almost rips into the next button, in his haste. “You have your marriage and your fame as a writer to think of, and I am left waiting. I cannot have my regiment, and I have been without my freedom. I thought that your affection was at least a constant. To be locked out so long, I was convinced there was nothing that could assuage me, until I realized what I needed to see. So don’t apologize. Show me.”

He does not want to whine. “John—”

Laurens rakes his nails down Alexander’s chest, drawing a gasp. “If you move, I will not share your bed. We have precious little time left. Prove its value to me.”

From the haze of the blindfold, he sees Laurens lean in, hands settling on his hips. They are close enough that if he was to move, he could press their bodies together. Laurens breathes across his lips. He yearns for the touch of his friend, for the seal of a kiss, but instead Laurens puts his teeth to the neck he has worked so hard to expose. The bright edge of pain in the bite makes the sweep of his tongue all the sweeter as he seals his mouth over a nerve.

“If you—stop—”

Laurens jerks away, pulling the blindfold down to Alexander’s neck. “I am sorry, my friend. Thank you for your patience with my anger, we need not go further if it is not to your desire.”

“If you stop I will be even more lost than I am now,” Alexander says. He opens his eyes, shocked at the devastation written on his friend’s face. This is another game, a play at strategy, rather than a true punishment. Of that he had no doubt. But it has caused such distress. The worry that he has crossed into a land where there is no returning path is written on the furrow of Laurens’s brow, in his friend’s shaking hands.

“Do you truly wish to continue?” Laurens asks.

Alexander tries for a smile. “With all my soul.”

“I love you,” Laurens says, and pulls him into a kiss, searing and sorrowful, like there is some antidote to this pain that they may only find together.

He touches the head of Alexander’s hardening cock through his breeches, and Alexander moans into his mouth. He can feel beading at the tip of his cock, Laurens rubbing the wet into his slit. Almost too much, to have the invasion of his tongue and the pressure of his fingers after so long alone. He jerks in the chair, hisses when the bonds rub against his wrist.

Laurens presses him back down, gentler than last time, stroking up his cock while he holds the back of his neck. His teeth graze Alexander’s lip. He can endure almost any sensation, knowing Laurens has him.

Then his fingers thread up through his hair and pull, tight the way he knows they both like. Alexander breaks the kiss to press their foreheads together while his eyes fill with tears. Laurens winds his hand up, catching a coil of long hair, and when he tugs down a whimper escapes Alexander’s lips. He kisses it away, the gentlest press of his mouth even as he sends needles through Alexander’s scalp with every moment. The insistent pressure goes on and on. He squeezes Alexander’s cock tight, in such a way that if he could move, would allow him to fuck up into Laurens’s hand, but he must atone with stillness. Before he notices it, Alexander is crying, more out of relief than pain.

“You’re wearing too many clothes to look this damned ruined,” Laurens says, his eyes wicked.

“I can’t change that,” Alexander says, shrugging to show he is still held fast. Tears drip down his cheeks, trace along his jaw.

Laurens drops to his knees, releasing Alexander’s hair. He runs his hands down his breeches, then leans forward, pressing his face to Alexander’s cock, nosing at it. Alexander draws in a breath, but Laurens keeps moving down, until he reaches Alexander’s boots.

Every morning in the camp, Alexander sat outside his tent, polishing his boots. General Washington had arranged for them after a swamp ruined his last pair. They were significantly more expensive than he could afford on his own. He would often discuss troop formations and political upheavals with his fellows as he checked his reflection in the leather.

That night, the night of confessions, Laurens had poured whiskey down his throat. After coughing for a minute straight, he admitted with a thick voice that he thought about those boots on Alexander when he found release. Originally, this information had flummoxed. Although they were of handsome craftsmanship, Alexander had always been more enamored of lack of clothing than any item.

Since then, he has begun to understand. He has been shown, by a fervent acolyte, the passion and temptation of his fine boots.

Laurens presses a kiss to the top, where it is turned out to show a generous swatch of light brown lining. He folds his hands over the back, pressing his face to it, breathing in the smell of the leather. When Laurens licks up the seam, the tightness of the fit allows Alexander to feel the path of his tongue, then the teeth of his bite on end of the lip, where the black begins.

At the ankle, where the leather folds to allow for movement, he rubs his cheek across it, panting. Laurens’s fingers dig into his calves, and he trails kisses up the leather, then down across the arch of Alexander’s foot. It is not deeply stimulating, but the reverence to his touch, the agony on his face when he looks up, lips still pressed to the boot, is not to be ignored.

Then he switches to the other side, treating it with no less time and attention, until even Alexander is squirming.

“Dear boy,” Laurens says. He gentles off the boots, rubbing his feet and setting them aside. His stockings are next, Laurens untying the green ribbons Alexander uses to hold them up. This time he does not filch one, instead rolls them down. The touch of bare skin burns through them both, after so long pressing at fabric and leather. Laurens’s eyes meet his, and he unbuttons the front of Hamilton’s breeches, reaches inside.

How long has it been since he was touched like this, Alexander wonders as Laurens fits his hand around his cock. He has been courting Eliza, and Laurens has spent so much time defending his home, and then as a prisoner. It feels as sensitive as the first time, when even interlocking fingers and knowing there was desire behind it made him so hard it hurt.

“Lift up,” Laurens says. Alexander raises his hips, pushing his shoulders back into the chair uncomfortably. He is rewarded when Laurens tugs his breeches down to his knees. He unbuckles the ends to remove them entirely.

He runs a finger up Alexander’s cock, causing him to whine. He taps his hips and Alexander, without thinking, lowers to the chair again. Laurens grasps the end of Alexander's shirt, pulls it over his head. The wide neck allows it to catch on his shoulders and bind his arms back even more. His arms are sweaty with layers of fabric, jacket pushing on waistcoat pushing on the contorted shirt.

Laurens flicks the ends of his jacket away from his chest, then rubs his nipples, hardened from the cold. He pinches, and Alexander tries not to show the impact. He has been bared completely to his friend, and Laurens merely pushed up his sleeves. There is no need for further display.

Then Laurens presses his fingers to Alexander’s mouth, traces the thickness of his bottom lip. “Suck,” he says.  
“So I may touch you.”

Alexander needs no explanation. He opens his mouth, letting Laurens softly stroke his tongue with the pads of his fingers, press deeper in. It tastes of the dust of books and sweat and faintly of the leather of his boots. Alexander looks away. Something in this is more fragile than letting himself be tied for him, than even taking his cock in his mouth has been before.

Two, and then three, and Alexander bites, pressing his tongue between digits. He does not choke, but his mouth waters, and Laurens coats his fingers in it, gently exploring. Alexander feels his shoulders drop, finally finding comfort against the chair. His Laurens lets out a sigh, weary and pleased.

“Excellent,” he says, and withdraws. Alexander chases his hand, presses a kiss to the back of his fingers. Laurens laughs, then flexing his hand, spreads the spit to his palm, to his thumb. He reaches down and slicks Alexander’s cock, his movements far too slow, pressing against where the head peeks out on the upstroke.

His other hand presses behind Alexander’s balls. The familiar tightening in his cock reveals that he is susceptible in other areas of enjoyment as well. Alexander averts his eyes, not wanting to ask. But Laurens must sense when his thighs shift slightly open, because he looks up, grin entirely too proud.

“I seem to remember a source of expensive oil?” Laurens asks.

“For my lamps,” Alexander says, shuddering as Laurens’s hand moves faster over his cock. “A present fondly meant and not to be abused—”

“If you did not desire abuse, you would not be in my grip,” Laurens says. “I haven’t had a chance to obtain the implements, given my confinement and hurry to arrive here. I want to feel inside you, as we used to. That warmth, the way you press against me, how you lose coherence.”

“I am in no position to stop you,” Alexander says. “and I am curious as to the sensation.”

“Far more comfortable—” at Alexander’s sudden interest, Laurens blushes. “Yes, Europe, you need not ask.”

Alexander smirks. “Bless the continent and its ruin of you.”

“If you thank Europe when you’re spread out beneath me I’ll make you choke on those words,” Laurens says. He retrieves the can of oil and places it on the floor. He kneels, taps the inside of Alexander’s thigh, and Alexander parts his legs, forcing his back against the chair.

He had washed before welcoming Laurens in anticipation of something similar. But his head still swims with shame when Laurens pours the oil over his fingers and then presses them forward, circling the edge of his hole.

When Laurens is not with him, he does not touch himself like this. It feels wrong, as if Alexander is stealing an act that belongs to another, a less-than-prepared understudy and disappointed audience all at once. The one time he attempted it, he came gasping, lonely and flooded with self-disgust.

But when Laurens rubs the pad of his thumb against him, he shifts his legs further apart, lets himself breathe out. He is boneless.

Laurens slides a finger in, just to the first joint, not truly penetrating but stretching and lovely nonetheless. Another joins it. He gentles them in and out, an exploration undertaken with fierce concentration as any assignment. The wet sound is as obscene as the sight of Laurens’s thin fingers pushing in below where Alexander can see, pulling away shiny with oil. Alexander presses his neck to the back of the chair. It always amazes him, how the opening feels, how easy it is to let John take him in any way he pleases.

“Enough oil?” Laurens asks, crooking up. His fingers find deeper purchase.

“Yes,” Alexander says, and then after, no more than a breath, “I beg you.”

Laurens shakes his head. “Not like this.”

“I could—”

“Hush,” Laurens says, and his hand is gone.

He takes Alexander’s legs apart, then kicks the chair back. He lays one heel of Alexander’s against the edge of the desk, then the other, until he is spread into a V. Alexander is balanced with the back half of the chair on the floor, his papers caught between his legs. Laurens nods, content, then pushes the chair down, so that he is kept upright by the anchor of his tied wrists, the rest of him completely displayed.

“You already know you are stunning specimen, my love, but allow me the repetition,” Laurens says. His eyes follow the path of Alexander’s body. He crouches again, using the same hand to finger him, but this time the digits slip in easily.

“Ah—” Alexander bears down, as Laurens crooks his fingers again, hooking onto his prostate. Warmth trickles through his body, and between them, his neglected cock twitches.

Then he is easing away, standing up, to take the looped cravat from his neck and pull it again to his eyes. Alexander assumed he had forgotten. It is even more tortuous, to be fucked on Laurens’s hands and not to see. He is left without sight, without touch, only the insistent pressure of his friend’s fingers, buried to the knuckle in his warmth.

“There we go,” Laurens says. The same tone he uses when Alexander fits his thoughts together after pacing, when he finally decides to rest for the night. But Alexander cannot control this, cannot decide to abandon his defenses. He only trembles, catching his ankles on the edge of the desk and trying not to slip.

Then Laurens twists his fingers, and his back arches, and he can feel it, the scrape against the nerve. His lips fall open, and then his friend moves again, thrusts firmer. The swell and fill of his knuckles inside of him keeps him from closing his mouth. He loses breath, loses speech. He loves it when Laurens fucks him, but his cock is rigid and less immediate, more of a gradual erosion of defenses. Here, he is not even allowed time to break. The noises he makes are indecent. Even if he was not blindfolded, he would not be able to open his eyes.

“Too much…” he says. His voice is dry from exhaustion.

But Laurens knows him far too well. “Are you sure? Tell me to stop.”

Then he crooks his fingers again, in and out, until only the tips are inside, circling gently, opening him.

“Touch me,” he says. His thighs tremble with exertion, holding his legs upon the desk. Keeping still, when all he wants to do is jerk away, pull closer.

“Too much, and then he asks for more.” Laurens’s hand, coated in oil, rubs the head of his cock. He moves in tandem, plunging his fingers in as he draws his palm up, and pleasure courses through Alexander.

He closes his eyes behind the blindfold. “Anything.”

“Relax,” Laurens says, and then he speeds his actions. “Let go for me, I will not be angry.”

Releasing his inhibitions is not the same as relaxing. There is no relaxing now, with his muscles roiling and his shoulders pulled tight, the head of the chair digging into his arms. But under the onslaught of sensations, he can find peace in surrender. There is nothing but the fullness of his hole, the blur that shoots through his mind when Laurens strokes that place inside him, and the clever hand holding him fast, rubbing up and down.

Then Laurens halts the pace of his fingers, pressing up and redoubling his touch, and Alexander’s cock twitches in his grip. He feels the build of pressure. It clenches in his gut and flows through his cock, pulled from him in each stroke. Yet it is not the same feeling as lying down on a bed, or sprawled in their tent, since all of him is still and his legs are higher than his waist. He is afraid, for a moment, until his body begins to sing anew, to drown all thoughts. He will not be able to control it. But John had asked him so sweetly.

“Gorgeous,” John says, when he begins to unravel.

He groans, low in his chest, pleasure shooting through him. In that moment, he is not tied to a chair, spread before a desk, blindfolded and helpless. He is floating over the ocean again, tossed and unsteady, and the only stability his friend, holding him fast everywhere he is burning. Laurens presses up harder, but he does not halt his hand on Alexander’s cock, stroking him through his little death as release splashes up his chest. Everywhere is warm, particularly Laurens’s fingers inside him. After he stops clenching around he slides out.

His hand still smeared with oil, Laurens takes one ankle and then the other, lowering him until he is upright again. His knees groan and his stomach clenches when the front legs of the chair hit the floor. The come on his chest begins to slide down his skin, sticky and thick, and his nose twitches in displeasure. Laurens steps away, and there is the cool press of a rag on his stomach, mopping up the come, cleaning his softening cock.

He pulls the blindfold away, and Alexander blinks into the light. Laurens drops the rag on the floor, and he kneels in front of him, looking up. Alexander’s chest still heaves. His ass feels open and sensitive, the ghost of what was done to him, written on the oil staining his thighs, the drying patches on his chest, the soreness in the back of his legs from holding still.

But Laurens looks undone, too, even though he is clothed and no blush stains his cheeks. He looks at Alexander the same way he does when he speaks in public, awe and admiration mingling. It is as if he can see everything that Alexander has endured, etched onto his person, in the tremble of his voice. That gaze first caused Alexander to hope, and it is no less precious now.

Then he lowers his mouth, and Alexander forgets to breathe.

He may have gifts of unusual stamina in matters of rhetoric, correspondence, and focus, but he is only a man. It hurts, when Laurens closes his mouth over Alexander’s softening cock and licks at it, so soon after release. There may be pleasure somewhere, but that is lost in the discomfort. He cries out. Laurens only hums around him, fastening his hands around Alexander’s waist, nails digging into the muscle there. The sensitized flesh begins to harden, welcoming its own abuse even as he whimpers from it. Laurens bites, gently, at the base, and Alexander jerks against his bonds, sliding forward in the chair.

“Hurts—”

And again Laurens licks around the head, turning his face up. Alexander gnaws at his lip, not wanting to ask for a cessation of the proceedings. He gives a small nod. Laurens grins around his cock, eyes bright with desire, and takes him deeper.

He allowed Laurens to await his company for hours, placing his work before the visit of a dear companion who underwent hardship to arrive at his door. He can take his mouth where it will bring pleasure soon. Laurens is here, with him, even if he is sore under his friend’s lips. And he cannot pretend that a dark thrill does not run through his blood, knowing that he is immobilized beneath him.

Slowly, he ignores the pain to focus on the sweep of Laurens’s hair across his cheek, on the beautiful sight of his lips shaped around him, paying no heed to the sensation itself. The attentions of his mouth were always a welcome distraction during long nights. He cannot refuse—he cannot escape—and so he shudders into the flat of his tongue, as pointed as a whip.

Every motion of his head, press of his tongue inside the slit, every circle traced on the skin around his hips, drags in his mind. His throat closes and his heart stutters. The same as awaiting a battle, the agony of listening for advance compared to the peace of war. Laurens mouths at a vein near the head of his cock, a little too like a kiss. When he fits his mouth around it, again, the wet heat begins to comfort instead of smother.

He must sense when Alexander’s moans no longer hold the high edge of pain, because that is when he pulls away. His cock stands at attention, again, slick with spit, and Laurens’s lips shine with it.

“I can take it,” Alexander says, but Laurens only laughs. There is not as much cruelty in his voice as there have been in his actions. His hands press to Alexander’s hips. He raises himself up, then he hooks a leg around the chair and lowers himself to Alexander’s lap.

To have Laurens so close, chest to chest, lips almost over his, may be the only sensation on earth that can stop his mind. He fights to keep still as Laurens presses down, the cotton of his pants scratching his skin. Alexander gasps when he lowers himself completely, hardness pressing onto his cock, too many layers in the way.

Then he begins to move, rocking against him, and he cannot help but kiss him.

Alexander fits his mouth over Laurens, finding familiarity across his tongue, faint bitter taste of his own seed. A flash of memory—Laurens seated on him completely, brow furrowed in concentration, the muscles in his thighs outlined by candlelight as he raised and lowered himself from Alexander’s cock, teeth set over his lip.

“Don’t forget the way I feel,” he’d told him, barely above a whisper, as John’s sweat trickled down his back and over his hand from where he steadied him.

“Never want to leave you,” Laurens had gasped back.

“You have permission to raise the regiment once you convince the state legislature, you must go—”

“Alexander, I’m departing, I meant…” he grabbed him by the shoulder, doubled his pace. “just let me have this…”

Alexander had peppered kisses up his neck so he would not moan aloud.

Now, Laurens breaks the kiss, looking down at him questioningly. “A familiar position,” Alexander says, and he hides his face in Laurens’s chest. “A remembrance. How I long to hold you.”

Laurens quirks an eyebrow, pushing their hips together, writhing on top of him. “And yet you did not show it until driven to the brink.” Alexander winces at the cloth dragging against his twitching cock.

“Let me service your desires. I let you use me as you see fit, and you are still unsatisfied. If I could only touch you…or if you want to fuck me, you have seen to it that I await you.”

Laurens grinds down again, chest rolling as he chases the pressure. He fists his hand in Alexander’s hair, fingertips massaging the back of his head, then pulling tight. As Alexander whimpers, he raises up from him, until he is on his feet, still straddling the chair. He yanks on his locks, forcing Alexander to look him in the eye.

“I will only present this choice once,” Laurens says. “Attend me. I will let you suck me, and hush your mouth to have my pleasure, or I will complete my practice upon your body. If you choose to take me, I will not give you release for a good while longer. I know you need to come now. There is the dilemma to think on.”

He does need release. Laurens’s hand, his mouth, his cock pressing on him through his trousers, the method hardly matters. He is sore and if left unattended, he will ache for it until granted mercy. The pride and rage his friend carries in his chest will lead to further cruelty if allowed. That passion he welcomes, when not directed at his own person.

But the last time he saw Laurens come apart, they awaited his departure for South Carolina. Since then Charleston has fallen and Alexander has entered an engagement, and the letters, so full of longing and promises, have not been nearly enough. His friend endured frustration, imprisonment, and Alexander’s own cruelty. He cannot leave him now.

He hungers to serve him, to bring pleasure that is not in Alexander's mere presence or his obedience. Alexander knows he is selfish. He will not be selfish here, in their first coupling since the war drew them apart. But surely he can allow Laurens to touch him. It will not be long until he comes again, until he can go to his knees or to the bed for his friend. But that is not the choice he has been given.

Tears prick in his eyes. The longer he deliberates, the tighter Laurens’s fist in his hair becomes.

“Let me please you,” Alexander says. He averts his eyes, unable to look at him.

But when he glances up for just a moment, Laurens is smiling. Perhaps he has passed whatever test was given, perhaps any answer would have sufficed. But he cannot help smiling back.

Laurens gathers the papers of his essay. “Governmental structure?” he asks, skimming a segment. Alexander tries to look sheepish. “No matter. Is this all?”

He nods. Laurens pushes them together, squaring the pages, and then places them on a bookshelf near the desk, away from their activities. Then he hefts his hips onto the desk, swinging his legs a little, and Alexander raises his eyebrows at him. His hands go to the front of his breeches, where the slight stain of wetness spreads from the head. He undoes each button carefully, with thin fingers that had so recently been inside of Alexander. He draws his cock from his breeches, running his hand from the head to the base.

Alexander wets his lips with his tongue without thinking.

Laurens reaches forward, tracing his jaw. He leans up to allow him access to his neck, but instead he hooks his fingers into Alexander’s hair again, pulling him forward roughly. Pain radiates from his scalp and he cannot brace himself. Laurens drags him until the back half of the chair is off the floor, and he is folded forward. He pulls Alexander to his cock.

Alexander opens his mouth, lets his tongue dart out to lick underneath the head, pushing against a vein. Laurens steadies him by pressing a boot to the edge of the chair-seat, the toe digging into his bare thigh.

“You ought to be less clothed,” Alexander says. He hopes to make it charming, smiling up at his friend. The tip of Laurens’s cock presses to his mouth, smearing across his lips in an obscene kiss.

“If you need respite, pull your head away and I will know to stop,” Laurens says. “Otherwise, I do not want to hear another word.”

Alexander relaxes his jaw. With the hand not tangled in his hair, Laurens guides his cock into Alexander’s mouth. He closes his eyes, savoring the weight on his tongue, the warm flesh pressing forward. Laurens begins to thrust shallowly, the ridge of the head dragging over the flat of his tongue. He adores the different textures, the soft skin and rigid length.

His own ache is unimportant. For now he is here, hair in Laurens’s fist, mouth filled with him, lost in the smell of cotton and musk of sex. He breathes to the rhythm of his friend’s hips canting up, shaping his mouth around the thickness. He could be on the edge of release at any moment and he would wait to feel this.

He curls his tongue to the head, and Laurens gasps above him, pace faltering. Alexander continues, siphoning salt from the tip. He moans at the taste of how his Laurens wants him, but most of it is muffled by another thrust.

“Ready?” Laurens asks. He looks up, mouth still claimed, shocked that there is more to be ready for.

Yet he nods all the same.

Instead of increasing the pace, Laurens pulls his hair, hard, sliding in agonizingly slow until Alexander chokes on warmth, wanting, and the cock pressing all the way down his throat. The dark curls above brush against his lips. He breathes desperately through his nose, every twitch in his muscles causing needles of pain against his scalp. His throat spasms around Laurens’s length, and saliva coats the cock in his mouth.

“Good,” Laurens says. Alexander loses the ability to think.

He is only alive where his friend is touching him. He is hair pulled tight and swollen lips pouting around hardness, and an abused throat, and the side of a thigh where the toe of a boot pushes in. He is nothing but wanting and wonder.

Tears gather in his eyes as he loosens his jaw and nudges his nose against Laurens’s firm abdomen. He bobs and sucks, despite barely being able to shift he is held so tight.

“If you move it will hurt,” Laurens says, voice almost above a growl. If Alexander were allowed—were able—to talk, he would only beg for pain. For anything.

He pulls back, halfway out of his mouth. Alexander barely has time to adjust to the loss before he slams his hips forward, again and again. He can only try to forget his own reflexes and let himself relax in his friend’s grip as tears begin to fall down his cheeks.

Laurens lets out a punctured sigh, falls back to thrust shallowly. Without his throat being filled, Alexander closes his eyes and leans into it. His wrists are beginning to ache, his shoulders pulled against the chair. He is still afraid to be dropped, because the only anchor he has is one foot and one hand.

He feels Laurens run his fingers up the part of his shaft that he is not shoving into Alexander’s mouth, the blunt edges of his nails against his swollen lips. Then he skims a touch across his jaw-line, and twitches his hips upward again. Alexander will never forget just how magnificent Laurens is. He moans around it, and his reward is another barrage, one-two-one-two. Saliva spills down his chin with the force of it.

Laurens suddenly arches forward, hand scrabbling in Alexander’s hair. “Oh, damn you.” His voice is hushed, shaking. “You’ll take—anything—” He begins to lose his pace, and Alexander can only nod in response, let the head of his cock slip into his throat again. “You feel…”

Just as he is shaking apart, he pulls away, tugging his hair harsher when his sensitized ridge rubs against Alexander’s lips as he disengages. Alexander looks up, against the hand still clenched in his hair. He sees Laurens stroking himself, cock slick with Alexander’s spit. Gentle hands rub up and down his length, wrist twisting at the head in the way that always makes him moan.

Suddenly, he pulls Alexander back, letting the chair legs hit the ground, and releases his head. His pleasuring becomes faster. He shifts the foot that used to hold the chair steady onto Alexander’s thigh, pressing his boot-toe in. Alexander hisses at the coolness of the leather, the steady pressure. Sweat shines on his friend’s face, and strands of his hair escape his tie. He is gloriously debauched and touching himself and not letting Alexander do anything but writhe under his boot as his chest begins to heave, as he hurdles toward completion—

The toe digs in further. Alexander whimpers, and Laurens groans, sounding for all the world like relief. His release falls onto Alexander’s chest in thin strings, painting him with warmth. He wants to turn away. Surely this is shameful. But John is still shuddering, stroking his cock, grinding his trouser-clad hips in a circle as the pleasure subsides. He cannot seem to tear his gaze from him. When Laurens opens his eyes, they are somehow both heavy and bright, and he looks to him, lost.

Laurens chuckles and takes his boot off Alexander’s thigh. He makes a punched-out noise and lurches forward, absence revealing the sting. There is a purplish cast to the skin already, where the toe was, and he knows it will soon bruise.

A drop of release landed on his chin, during the denouement. Now Laurens takes it on his finger, holds it up for him to see, then presses the pad to Alexander’s lips. He darts his tongue forward, noticing a sore spot at the back of his throat where his friend’s advances proved less than delicate, and sucks down the bitter liquid.

“It was…lord, Alexander,” he says, shaking his head. “Your mouth is amazing. The sweetness of your attentions almost made me want to forgive you.”

He grins. “I was promised some matter of satisfaction after that allowance.”

Laurens rubs his finger over Alexander’s lips, one last time. “Not soon after, if you’ll remember.”

Yet he grasps his cock all the same, hand slick with Alexander’s own spit, pulling his palm over the head in a circle. It's far too much and still a tease. When he finally begins to stroke, pressing underneath the ridge every so often, Alexander melts.

“The way you looked down at me when you took my mouth… oh, lord, I love you, I need you, you cannot leave—John—”

John kneels, until he is at eye level. He clasps Alexander’s shoulder, and his touch slows down, the bastard. “I’m here, my friend.”

He kisses him, and Alexander is lost, in the rhythm of their tongues and of his skilled fingers. The hand that was on his shoulder grips the back of his neck, steadying him. Laurens tastes exquisite, dark with the edge of sweat.

He remembers how his mouth felt on him, breathes hard past his friend’s lips. Laurens had been so unyielding, even as Alexander squirmed with the after-effects of his previous release. He would have treasured completion then. He'd watch his friend drink him down, tied and pleasured. Unable to run his hands through his hair, to stroke those sloping shoulders, to do anything but receive. That image, coupled with the insistent motions of the hand on him, pull him toward the edge.

Laurens pulls back, arches an eyebrow. “Are you about to…?”

Alexander nods.

Laurens stops, and instead he gentles one finger up his cock. He traces a vein and ends at the tip, then he travels down again. Alexander groans, and not from pleasure. “How much longer must I suffer?”

“If my touch is to be suffered, I have no wish to prolong your discomfort,” Laurens says. “But come, there is no need to argue, with such little time left to have your company. I have been of no use to the Family, as a prisoner of war, and I know my letters must have worried you. Let me prove my offers of assistance.”

“That is what I am asking,” Alexander says, through his teeth.

Laurens pivots, reaches for the essay, squared away from when he perched on the desk, and clears his throat. “‘It would be the extreme of vanity in us not to be sensible that we began this revolution with very vague and confined notions of the practical business of government.’ Are you sure you want to begin by insulting America?”

Alexander nods. “I worked a half-hour on that sentence, the opening is crucial, I cannot change it.” Then he realizes the game and frowns. “And that isn’t…I am not looking for a critique, currently, given that I just finished the draft.”

“You gave this enough of your time, I would feel amiss to neglect it,” Laurens says, smile playing across his lips.

“Hurt me again before you savage my work. I only—”

Laurens points a threatening finger. “I will gag you if you have forgotten our roles and your place.”

He bites his lip. At least unencumbered he will be able to defend himself. “And after, you will finish it?”

Laurens nods. “If you keep your mouth still you may have mine after. Now, am I this ‘qualified individual’ you speak of, and the prejudice impeding good governance that of the South Carolina legislature? No, don’t answer me.”

He paces behind, muttering the words. “‘There have been many false steps, many chimerical projects and failed endeavors and utopian speculations...’ This is far too wordy, are you only to discuss the weaknesses of your beliefs? This is almost one of your letters in which I am the only object in the world who has not earned your hatred.”

Touch me, Alexander thinks, but does not say. This essay has far less of Laurens than he would speculate. He is sick of it after spending hours finishing the writing instead of engaging with his friend. As much as he is sure he will find release later to the intensity of Laurens’s eyes and taking the brunt of his anger, it was a mistake to truly hurt him. Let it be done, he pleads, with his face since he is not allowed to talk. Take all; and let it be done, and let the words be forgotten.

“I think you ought to explain further your accusations that lack of refinement and improvement after we found our new government will be a sin rather than an error,” Laurens says. “I agree, but you may have an uphill battle with others.”

In between his reading aloud to himself, he takes the time to laugh. “Greece, Alexander? Again?”

“My Damon—”

Laurens whirls around, grabbing the back of the chair. “I ought to hit you for talking only to say that,” he says, but he is still smiling. Then he sees Alexander shudder and his cock twitch, and he lowers the essay to catalog his reaction. “You did mention the possibility before, I remember. Anyway, ‘This, and the conspicuous absence of a solid federal union to restrain the ambition and rivalship of the different cities, after a rapid succession of bloody wars, as it follows, ended in their total loss of liberty…’”

He continues with Alexander’s emphasis on federal power. He notes clunky phrasing and his own opinion on proceedings as they happen. Alexander winces each time, not out of disagreement but from listening without being able to see his work, without being able to change it, or defend himself.

“‘The ambition and local interests of the respective members will be constantly undermining and usurping upon its prerogatives till it comes to a dissolution, if a partial combination of some of the more powerful ones does not bring it to a more speedy and violent end.’” Laurens finishes. “The conclusion is well-spoken, but overlong. This will be a great essay, in time. Is it worth the disrespect you have shown me?”

Alexander looks up at him.

“You may answer,” Laurens says.

“I need you,” Alexander says. “The edits are wise, although I do not agree with some. As to your question, I already apologized, and I have shown my obedience.”

Laurens reaches out, runs a hand through his hair, tenderly until he reaches the nape of his neck. Alexander shivers. “So you have,” he says. “How are you?”

“My wrists ache, and my shoulders, from the chair. I am not sore inside. My pride is in tatters from your critique, but humiliating weakness is ever the consequence my ardor for you. I can find another release if that is what you see fit to give me. Show me how to keep a promise.”

“I am yours, my dear,” Laurens says. He drops to his knees and bows his head.

After earlier attentions, even the press of his tongue up the ridge of Alexander’s cock feels as sweet as the most gifted maneuver. He gasps, arranges his bound hands to pinch his left palm, steadies himself. He wants to fuck into the heat of his friend’s mouth, but he showed already that he can behave. So as Laurens slowly traces all the way up him from the base, he digs his nails in, the pain calming. He moves down again, and up, savoring, and Alexander lets his head rest against the back of the chair, staring at the ceiling.

“I swear if another ever takes me apart as you do I will not be able to return to coherency.”

Laurens looks up from his cock, possession in his eyes. “No one has been dearer.” It is a question, and a statement.

“Even my marriage will not—”

“Please,” Laurens says, and he takes Alexander into his mouth completely.

“John,” Alexander says, groaning. He is not hoping marriage will lose him all other loves, as Laurens is. This will not be the last time. As long as there are hours they can steal away, between missions and work and their families, he will offer himself. And he knows, even though his friend will not tell him, that he will always be accepted.

Laurens bobs his head, releasing the seal of his lips to let spit soak down his cock. Alexander finds the grip on his palm again, because he is moving faster, and every moment stretches on. Laurens’s clothes are intact and his hair is immaculate, there are no tear-tracts down his face to match. But his cheeks are flushed and his lips darkened. When he looks up, pressing the head underneath his tongue, his eyes speak volumes. His eyes are more eloquent than Alexander could ever be.

Inside his gut, the coil of pleasure moving toward its apex. “It’s approaching, John,” he says, no more than a breath. Laurens nods around his cock, redoubling his efforts. The slide of his mouth is warm and the curl of his tongue expert. But it is the hint of teeth at the base of his cock when he takes all of him that makes him shudder.

Alexander closes his eyes when he comes, unable to experience anything beyond the rush. He is halfway in Laurens’s mouth, and his friend continues sucking as each wave of pleasure obliterates. He lets the liquid escape his lips and fall down his cock, sticky in his curls. Alexander’s chest is heaving when he opens his eyes, to the last rays of sun, the lamp still burning merrily as if its oil had not been corrupted. To John on his knees before him, smiling with his achievement.

“Lord above,” he says. His voice trembles.

Laurens reaches for the rag he left on the floor, cleans his cock and stomach of spend. “He will surely be glad our sin is over.”

Alexander groans as Laurens parts his legs to wipe away the remains of oil between them. Every discomfort he has endured during these hours suddenly flares into pain. Laurens is behind him, tugging the top half of his clothing up and over his head again, then untying his hands. He brings his arms around, wincing when it pops one of his shoulders. Reddish and dull purple patterns of rope encircle his wrists. He tests them, presses a fingertip into his pulse point. The tenderness there should not stir his blood the way it does.

“Alexander?” Laurens asks.

He looks up, feeling foolish in his rumpled shirt, waistcoat, and nothing else.

“Are you alright?” Laurens asks. He gestures to the clothing strewn about the room. “Do you need me to…take care of you?”

He is sore and a little overwhelmed, not invalid. Still, to honestly hold him, with his own arms and no punishment or restraint in the way, would be sweet as anything. He opens his mouth to ask for a moment of respite, then remembers the essay.

“I have to finish it,” he says.

Laurens leans forward. “I assure you I am quite satisfied—”

“The essay, your commentary was insightful despite the rest of our situation. I cannot forget each correction in my haze. If I cannot edit now, I will fidget throughout dinner with my future family.”

He scoots up to the desk, trying not to blush as he remembers what just transpired on it, and finds the papers. Alexander moves through his words as fast as possible. He recalls each correction, making notes in the margins, drawing a pointing hand where he has no answers yet. Laurens watches over his shoulder, smirking.

“Done,” he says, breathing easy now that he has marked “too long” above the conclusion. He turns, and his friend holds out his pants and cravat. Alexander takes them and dresses. Perhaps he makes a bit of a show at the boots, but he is still too undone to deliver a real tease.

He arranges his waistcoat, buttoning it carefully, assuring himself that the marks around his wrists will not be visible. It would be mortifying to passing food to his future bride only to expose his proclivities publicly.

“I feel wonderful, by the way,” he says, to John, once he is dressed. “Even in all the places you have hurt me. The memories we can give each other…I would not have another, dearer friend, for any in the world.”

Laurens smiles, brushes his still-loose hair behind his ears. “I never before understood why you were so forgiving with my anger and cruelty. Thank you for showing me. For letting me.”

He leans forward, his lips almost meeting Alexander’s. This time, he is not tied down and chastised. He can grab him around the waist and meet the kiss, sloppy with exhaustion, smiling against his friend’s lips.

They walk hand in hand to the parlor. Alexander rests his head in his friend’s lap as Laurens opens _De Rerum Natura_ and resumes his reading. His fingers card through his loose hair, as gentle as they had once been cruel.

It is in this configuration that his Betsy and her Angelica find them, relaxed, accomplished, at peace.

His bride claps her hands together when she sees. “Colonel Laurens!” She curtsies, and he looks up languidly, marking his place in the book. “My Hamilton said you were not allowed to visit—”

“I will not be able to attend your nuptials, is the pity,” Laurens says. He strokes over Alexander’s hair again, and then tugs. Alexander forces himself to be still, biting his lip not to cry out. “You are handsome as the portrait he allowed me to look on, Miss Schuyler.”

Alexander rises from his sprawl. When he goes to hold Betsy, she wraps her arms around his back and presses where the chair had dug into his shoulder. “I have told her often of your gallantry and true friendship,” he says to Laurens.

“Who could know each other better than brothers in war?” Angelica asks. She offers Laurens her hand. “You do us the honor of dining at our table tonight, Colonel.”

He kisses it. “Madam, the honor is in your presence,” he says.

Alexander nods, past the tension in his neck, and smiles. “Angelica, I was just editing an essay on the future federal structure that I think would be most agreeable to your interests.”

“Tell me of it, dearest,” she says.

He takes his future sister’s arm. Laurens and Eliza link hands, and they begin the journey to the dining-room.

**Author's Note:**

> The essay they discuss is at: http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2121  
> It's the one published by Loudon’s New York Packet Company July 12, 1781.
> 
> Nil fieri ex nihilo, in nihilum nil posse reverti = nothing comes from nothing, and nothing can be reduced to nothing.


End file.
